Need for achievement and performance on measures of behavioral fluency.

This investigation was designed to assess the relationship between a validated personality characteristic, need for achievement (nAch), and performance on measures of behavioral fluency. To infer this relationship, 50 neurologically intact college undergraduates were administered a questionnaire assessing nAch and a battery of tests including a short form of the WAIS and measures of behavioral fluency (i.e., verbal fluency). Statistical analysis indicated that subjects high on nAch obtained higher scores than subjects low on nAch on the measures of figural fluency and the WAIS Verbal Scale. No significant difference on verbal fluency was seen between the two groups. Secondly, the group high on nAch also had a higher mean Verbal IQ but not a higher mean Performance IQ as measured by a short form of the WAIS than did subjects scoring low on nAch.     

Methodological and dispositional predictors of congruence between implicit and explicit need for achievement

In this research, the authors questioned the statistical independence of implicit and explicit motives. Their first aim was to identify a methodological factor that may have weakened implicit-explicit motive correlations in past research. Their second aim was to identify personality traits that moderate implicit-explicit motive congruence. They found that implicit and explicit need for achievement (nAch) are significantly correlated, but only if the implicit and explicit measures are matched in content. Three traits were found to uniquely moderate the relationship between implicit and explicit nAch: private body consciousness, self-monitoring, and preference for consistency. These findings indicate that implicit and explicit nAch are systematically related and suggest that some individuals may use implicit nAch as a foundation for the development of explicit nAch.     

The Effect of Organizational Cultural Norms on the Relationships Between Personnel Practices and Employee Commitment

Because of contradictory correlations between occupational need for achievement (nAch) and locus of control (LOC), this study tested the extrinsic need for job security (nSec) as a moderator of the association. A total of 383 female subjects in two occupations were studied. A high level of nSec externalized internal LOC beliefs associated with a high level of nAch. Depending on occupational group, nSec, or its absence, could also be the sole predictor of LOC, thus also causing the positive correlation between nAch and LOC. In subjects over 50 years old, internal LOC was associated with presence of a high level of nSec. The correlational association between nAch and LOC is limited and misleading because of the contribution of nSec to the association between these two variables.     

Using the multifaceted Rasch model to improve the TAT/PSE measure of need for achievement

We used the Rasch (1980) model to develop new pictures for the Thematic Apperception Test (C. D. Morgan & Murray, 1938; McClelland, Atkinson, Clark, & Lowell, 1953) or picture story exercise to measure need for achievement (nAch). In Experiments 1 and 2, we analyzed stories to assess the difficulty level of a total of 8 pictures using the multifaceted Rasch model with picture difficulty, story probe difficulty, and participant ability as facets with a partial credit model (FACETS; Linacre, 2005). A total of 6 pictures were retained and 4 new ones added for Experiment 3 in which 201 participants wrote 6 stories to a random set of the 10 pictures. FACETS analysis revealed improved person separation reliability. In Experiment 4, 206 participants wrote 1 story to the Studying picture either before or after filling out a battery of achievement-related questionnaires. The 2 experimental groups did not differ in the amount of nAch in their stories. The coder facet was demonstrated with 2 independent coders using the revised coding system for nAch.     

Fear of Success,Need Achievement,and Fear of Failure: A factor analytic study

Several tests of Fear of Success (FOS), Fear of Failure (FOF), and Need Achievement (nAch), plus Taylor's Manifest Anxiety Scale and a social desirability scale were administered to 104 males and 101 females. FOS, FOF, and nAch did not show factor validity. Results for predictive validity were also poor. Anxiety defined the first factor in the factor analysis. All first-factor tests negatively predicted female grade point average and American College Test scores. All the first-factor tests showed sex differences, with females scoring higher. A clarifying role for anxiety in the study of sex differences in achievement is indicated.     

Implicit achievement motive limits the impact of task difficulty on effort-related cardiovascular response

In contrast to the motive literature, motivational intensity theory predicts that the implicit achievement motive (nAch) should only exert an indirect impact on effort by limiting the impact of task difficulty. To contrast these two views, sixty-eight participants with a low or high nAch performed an easy or difficult arithmetic task. Effort was assessed using cardiac pre-ejection period (PEP). Supporting motivational intensity theory’s view, PEP response was low in both easy-task conditions but stronger in the high-nAch group than in the low-nAch group in the difficult task. These findings suggest that nAch exerts an indirect effect on effort investment by setting the maximally justified effort instead of directly determining the amount of effort that is invested to satisfy the motive.     

Motivated but not engaged: The implicit achievement motive requires difficult or unclear task difficulty conditions to exert an impact on effort

Integrating the achievement motive literature and motivational intensity theory, we expected the implicit achievement motive (nAch) to directly determine effort mobilization when task difficulty is unclear. However, nAch should interact with task difficulty in determining effort mobilization when task difficulty is clear. Participants worked on an easy versus difficult memory task (Study 1) or a clear versus unclear arithmetic task (Study 2). We used the Picture-Story-Exercise to assess nAch and pre-ejection period (PEP) to operationalize effort. As predicted, PEP reactivity was strong in the difficult-high-nAch condition and in the unclear-high-nAch condition but low in the other three conditions. Supporting motivational intensity theory, our results showed that nAch requires difficult or unclear task conditions to exert a noticeable impact on effort.     

Measuring needs with the thematic apperception test: a psychometric study

Three apperception theories that explain how people respond to Thematic Apperception Test cards are proposed: a simple apperception theory, an apperception theory with a dynamic component, and an apperception theory with 2 types of responses. Each theory is translated into an item response theory model and is applied to need for achievement (nAch) data. The analysis indicates that the best fitting model is provided by the apperception theory with 2 types of responses, also referred to as the drop-out apperception theory. The 1st type of response predicted by this theory is determined by the nAch level of the person and the achievement-response-eliciting value of the card; this response is diagnostic for the nAch level of the person. The 2nd type of response is not determined by the 2 aforementioned characteristics and is therefore not diagnostic of the person's nAch level. The results are cross-validated for need for power and need for affiliation.     

MOTIVATION OF MANAGERS: IS GENDER A FACTOR?

Respondents consisted of 124 working managers (62 men, 62 women) whose needs for Achievement (nAch), Affiliation (nAff), and Power (nPwr) were tested using two types of Thematic Apperception Tests, male-oriented and balanced as to sex. Results of a two-way ANOVA indicate that women managers have a higher nAch, a not significantly different nAff, and a higher nPwr than managerial men. Changing social values as well as the obstacles women face in first getting managerial jobs and then having to overcome sex-role conflicts-all possibly channel a specific type of woman into these managerial positions, as other factors act to select men.     

nAch, risk-taking propensity, locus of control and entrepreneurship

Seventy-one entrepreneurs and 62 non-entrepreneurs were given tests of Locus of Control and Risk-taking Propensity, as well as nAch. Significant differences were found and led to a clarification of the concept of entrepreneurship.     

DO PEOPLE MAKE THE PLACE? AN EXAMINATION OF THE ATTRACTION-SELECTION-ATTRITION HYPOTHESIS

This study tests the hypotheses that (1) congruence between internal need states and external environments drives the organizational-choice process and (2) those attracted to particular organizations are more homogeneous than the applicant pool in general. Subjects were evaluated on 14 needs using the Jackson Personality Research Form. They then viewed two video-taped segments of simulated campus interviews to gain information about two distinct types of organizational reward systems. The interview segments entered the discussion in progress to avoid any reference to a particular job that might introduce an occupational confound. Subjects received job offers from both organizations and were asked to indicate which of the two organizations they found more attractive by accepting one of the offers. Analysis of variance results indicated only weak support for the congruency hypothesis. Differences were observed in nAch between the groups of subjects attracted to each organization. No differences were found for any of the other need strength measures. This suggests that the subjects attracted to the different organizations were substantially similar. Hierarchial factor analysis of the PRF has suggested a six-factor structure that appears consistent with the second-order factors from other respectable personality measures. This suggests that the second-order solution may be a parsimonious mapping of the personality domain and may therefore be more relevant in testing these hypotheses. The analysis was repeated using these dimensions. The results suggest that work force homogeneity may be more complex than originally considered. Implications for the homogeneity hypothesis are discussed, and suggestions for further study of this concept are offered.     

Achievement dynamics: The interaction of motives,cognitions, and emotions over time

Abstract

The history of research on achievement striving has been characterized by the development of several separate lines of inquiry in relative isolation, one from the other. Three themes are most notable: research on need achievement (motivation), formulations of test anxiety (emotion), and the exploration of information-processing (cognitive) factors with special attention given to the organization of effective study skills. In the absence of a unified approach to an understanding of achievement behavior, research has been largely confined to attempts to establish simple one-to-one correspondences between various organizing constructs, say, test anxiety, and the achievement outcomes they are thought to influence. For instance, a veritable flood of studies beginning at the turn of the century has demonstrated the existence of a negative relationship between level of anxiety arousal and performance across a variety of testing and assessment conditions (for a review, see Heinrich & Spielberger, 1982). Likewise, individual variations in level of need achievement (nAch) have been associated with preferences for risk taking and study persistence (Atkinson, 1957, 1964).     

Sex-role change, anomie and female suicide: a test of alternative Durkheimian explanations.

Durkheim's influential book, Suicide, provides general (economic) anomie, conjugal anomie, and sex-role convergence explanations of changes in suicide rates under conditions of social change. We used trend analyses of American suicide rates and female/male suicide ratios from 1950 to 1984 and the regression of the ratios on female educational attainment, white female labor force participation, white fertility rates, and divorce rates to examine these explanations. The general anomie explanation of female suicide trends is supported for the middle-aged (30 to 54 years) but not for the young (10 to 30 years) or the elderly (55 to 74 years). The conjugal anomie proposition is at best supported for age groups between 15 and 44 when general anomie is not pronounced. The role convergence explanation is rejected for all 13 5-year-age-groups. General anomie may not be a viable explanation of suicide trends for groups actively supporting relevant social changes or not yet tradition-bound or for groups whose retirement status reduces the importance of some social changes.     

The Raven's progressive matrices: change and stability over culture and time

Data relating to the stability and variation in the norms for the Raven's Progressive Matrices Test (a well-validated measure of basic cognitive functioning) for different cultural, ethnic, and socioeconomic groups on a worldwide and within-country basis are first summarized. Subsequent sections deal with variation over time. A possible explanation for the variation in norms over time and between ethnic groups within countries is offered.     

Age and responding-hand related changes in performance of neurologically normal subjects on the line-bisection and chimeric-faces tasks

This study investigated age and responding-hand (left, right, and bimanual) related changes in visuospatial attention. Two tasks were completed by 107 neurologically normal right-handed subjects ranging in age from 5 to 70 years and distributed across four age groups. Task-specific differences between groups were apparent. In the line-bisection task, the younger and older groups displayed symmetrical neglect while the young and middle groups displayed pseudoneglect. In the chimeric-faces task the leftward bias was less pronounced in the older group and more susceptible to responding-hand effects in the middle and older groups. Whilst results, especially those of the bimanual method, provided strong support for an activation model, they imposed an age limitation on its appropriateness as an explanation for performance on the chimeric-faces task. Results are discussed as reflecting changes in the corpus callosum and right hemisphere.     

Effects of speed and accuracy instructions on performance in a visual search task by children with good or poor attention

Children rated by teachers as having good or poor attention ability carried out a visual search task in which they were required to find a series of targets in a complex display. Different groups were told to concentrate on either speed or accuracy. Previous studies using this task have consistently shown that children rated as having poor attention make more errors (false alarms to non‐targets in the display), but do not differ in the time to make a correct response; this result was replicated. Though the instructions produced wide differences in speed and error rates in the expected directions, these differences were similar in both attention groups and the differences in error rates between the two groups remained unchanged. It is suggested that these findings are not compatible with the view that children with poor attention make errors primarily due to fast impulsive responding, nor with an explanation in terms of slower processing of the input by such children. An alternative explanation of the high error rates in such children is offered in terms of weak executive function resulting in poor ability to inhibit false alarms to non‐targets.     

Some dubious premises in research and theory on racial differences. Scientific, social, and ethical issues

The scientific premises for looking for statistical differences between groups designated as races (on somewhat arbitrary grounds) are questionable. The explanation of such differences in strictly biological-evolutionary terms is even more dubious. Studies of temperament, basic personality traits, disorders (such as antisocial personality), and specific genetic markers show that there is much more variation within groups designated as races than between such groups. Investigators and theoreticians interpreting such differences on the basis of limited sampling within the three broad racial groups should be careful to avoid selectivity and misrepresentation of data that serve racist ideology, and should be cautious about presenting their theories to the public through inappropriate media forums.     

Daily stress and anxiety and their relation to daily fluctuations of symptoms in asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) patients

Although stress and anxiety have long been assumed to play an exacerbatory role in asthma, no study has systematically documented that daily exacerbations of asthma symptoms are related to stress and/or anxiety. In this study, 24 airways obstruction patients (12 asthmatics and 12 chronic obstructive pulmonary disease patients) were instructed to monitor the severity of daily respiratory symptoms. In addition, subjects recorded their daily anxiety level and the number and perceived impact of daily stressors. The results showed that although there were differences between high- and low-stress days for both groups, there were no differences between groups on symptom severity or between high- and low-anxiety days, as measured by the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI). Thus, although the number and impact of daily stressors were found to be directly associated with the severity of asthma symptoms, anxiety does not appear to have a direct role in the exacerbation of asthma. The findings failed to support the anxiety theory of asthma but provided an explanation for the poor results obtained in previous treatment studies which employed anxiety management with asthmatics.     

样例类型与解释方式对初中生数学概率问题解决的效果

为考察样例类型与解释方式对初中生数学概率问题解决的促进作用,实验1随机选取初中生90名,比较正确样例组、正误样例组、对照组的学习效果,实验2随机选取另外90名初中生,比较有教学解释、有自我解释与无解释的正误样例组的即时与延时测试学习效果,研究发现:(1)正误样例学习效果显著好于正确样例;(2)有解释的正误样例学习效果显著好于无解释的正误样例;(3)与有教学解释的正误样例学习效果相比,有自我解释的正误样例学习效果显著且更持久。     

Production of lexical categories in French children with SLI and in normally developing children matched for MLU

Free speech recording samples of two groups of French SLI children aged 48 and 62 months (matched for MLU, 1.70) and two groups of French normally developing children aged 26 and 36 month (matched for MLU, 3.2) were compared to determine whether they showed a difference in the use of lexical categories. A category-by-category comparison showed few significant differences. For low MLU children, SLI produced significantly fewer infinitives, past participles, copulas, and demonstrative pronouns. For high MLU children, the difference persisted only in past participles use. As for English SLI children, French SLI children were delayed in their acquisition of verbs. However, the differences in the syntactic structure of English and French ruled out a syntactic explanation of the deficit. Phonetic problems seem to decrease with age, so they cannot be the only explanation behind the difficulties of SLI children, which probably involve cognitive problems such as processing limitations.